Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio took the stand for six hours this week in a civil rights trial accusing him of using racial profiling to target undocumented immigrants in Arizona. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund filed the lawsuit on behalf of residents targeted at traffic stops for detention, despite having a valid visa and identification. As Arpaio testified, four undocumented immigrants were...

Several major unions joined with immigrant rights activists and tens of thousands of Occupy Wall Street protesters in New York City for a massive rally that marched to Wall Street. "I’m here today to support the efforts of May Day in fighting as a coalition to protect working families, struggling families and individuals — quite frankly, known as the 99 percent — to make sure that our issues, our causes are not forgotten...

A new PBS documentary exposes the tasing and beating death of a Mexican immigrant by U.S. border agents in California and has renewed scrutiny of what critics call a culture of impunity. In May 2010, 42-year-old Anastasio Hernández-Rojas was caught trying to enter the United States from Mexico near San Diego. He had previously lived in the United States for 25 years and was the father of five U.S.-born children. But instead of deportation,...

Sean Arce, the head of the Tucson school district’s banned Mexican American Studies program, was dismissed Tuesday night amid vocal protests from dozens of supporters. Tucson’s Mexican American Studies program has been under attack following the passage of a bill which prohibits schools from offering ethnic studies courses. Arce maintains he was fired because he spoke out against what he saw as a discriminatory law targeting Mexican Americans...

As Georgia votes in its Super Tuesday primary, the State Senate has voted to ban undocumented immigrant students from all public universities. Undocumented students from Georgia are already barred from the state’s five most competitive schools and must pay out-of-state tuition at other state schools. "Telling us that we cannot obtain higher education, that we cannot go to college or community college, even if we work hard and do our...

Both Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich have been trying to court Florida’s Latino voters ahead of next week’s primary. Romney has launched Spanish-language ads highlighting Gingrich’s remarks in a 2007 speech in which he suggested Spanish was a "language of the ghetto." Meanwhile, Gingrich has released an ad accusing Romney of being the most anti-immigrant candidate in the Republican field. We’re joined by Marcos...

The family of a Dallas teenager Jakadrien Turner is demanding answers after she was deported to Colombia, despite the fact that she is a U.S. citizen and speaks no Spanish. Turner, a 15-year-old African-American runaway, was living in Houston when she was arrested for shoplifting and gave police a fake name that belonged to a 22-year-old undocumented immigrant from Colombia with warrants for her arrest. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement...

The arrest of a high-profile undocumented protester has brought immigration issues to the forefront of the movement. In California on Monday, Francisco "Pancho" Ramos Stierle was seized while meditating at Oscar Grant Plaza during an early morning raid on the Occupy Oakland encampment. Rather than being released on bail, Pancho was turned over to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement custody under the Secure Communities program,...

The architect of Arizona’s controversial anti-immigration law, Russell Pearce, lost a major recall election Tuesday night, becoming the first Arizona state senator ever to do so. He is required to step down immediately and will be replaced by newly elected Republican Jerry Lewis. Pearce wrote Senate Bill 1070, which requires police to investigate the immigration status of people they have lawfully detained. He was also behind an effort...